The Smiths: The Sound of the Smiths (Deluxe Edition) (Warner Bros.)
Had Morrissey taken a vow of silence, and Marr left his guitar in a battered, stickered case, the legacy of the Smiths would stand secure. The Lennon and McCartney of indie rock created an almost divine catalog of songs, a soundtrack for the lives of others, a perfect collision of hope and sorrow. This timely compilation acts as a perfect reminder of the glories flown, and will likely convert certain stragglers from among the uninitiated. The Smiths already are a generation distant.
The strange collaboration between a shy and retiring intellectual and the finest, most inventive guitarist of his generation proved one of the most fertile of the Eighties. Not that this compilation is a mere trawl down memory lane. The songs remain as intensely vibrant as the day the needle first hit the groove. The collision of lyrical wit and musical verve still staggers. The majesty of "How Soon Is Now" both humbles and delights. A churning engine of inspired near-eastern dirge-like divinity, it plows on with relentless verve.
"I am human and I need to be loved. Just like anybody else does."
Stand in the presence of genius and wonder. Morrissey the master of a well-turned phrase proved the perfect cloak for Marr's smoldering and mesmeric licks. There is a timelessness at play here. These songs would still explode into the minds of any potential audience, but they are twenty years in the can, and their magic is intoxicatingly conserved. Morrissey's pronounced ambiguity helped evoke an enigmatic status he still maintains, his songs perfect statements from the hinterlands of the human condition. "Barbarism Begins at Home" is still a crazed infectious confection, embellished by Morrissey's plaintive yelp and Marr's dizzying dexterity, while "That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore" remains the perfect song to close the disco at the end of the world. "I've seen this happen in other people's lives and now it's happening in mine" is an aphorism that should be spoon-fed to all idealists. In "There Is a Light And It Never Goes Out," he proclaims:
"If a double decker bus crashes into us / To die by your side is such a heavenly way to die. / And if a ten-ton truck kills the both of us / To die by your side, well the pleasure and the privilege is mine. "
The pure beauty of loving another, and of leaving this world together has rarely been so simply but profoundly expressed. Pop as poetry. The band bowed out with their many strengths intact. Though a return seems at best unlikely, their merits stand two decades on as a heady mixture of inspiration mingled with memory. Iconic and ironic, their work sounds immensely vital, at times a surreal combination of inspired riffs and verbal dexterity. They remain a source of inspiration and envy.
"Shyness is nice, but Shyness can stop you / From doing all the things in life that you'd like to."
"Ask" is a witty twist on the reticence of vulnerable youth. Each generation experiences the emotional woes of all those who've cried before them. Morrissey remains the perfect soothsayer, a giver of cooling wisdoms, but a source of heart-felt consolation. As a chronology of their singles, this collection is a near-perfect primer, from "Hand in Glove" right through to "Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me." A reminder to the devoted and a timely introduction for the uninitiated, who can then plunder the majestic albums. A collection of finely polished gems, this is a legacy few have garnered in a smattering of vital years. Johnny Marr helped compile this anthology. It can't have escaped his thoughts that he has released nothing from the past two decades that comes close to this level of brilliance. Such is the fickle nature of inspiration, and the unique gifts bestowed by collaboration.